


Deep within your soul

by meinposhbastard



Series: The kit and the pup [2]
Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Angst, Dark, Dark Humor, Fluff, Happy Ending, Humor, M/M, Mentions of Suicide, Non-Chronological, Protective!Peter, Slow Burn, eventually, non-graphic violence between main pair, pissed spideypool, protective!wade, puppy!Wade, salty!Peter, salty!Wade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-01
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-09 17:42:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17411360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meinposhbastard/pseuds/meinposhbastard
Summary: A curse that starts with a vow, a body shape he didn't ask for, complicated feelings, and a relationship that can't lead to anything good.Not for Peter, Wade's sure.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The M-rating is for one scene that might come across as particularly gruesome (not between main pair), not for sex.
> 
> This is a sort of companion to the kitty fic, which is why I put them in a series, but it doesn't continue or is meant to take elements from the previous fic (except, probably, the transformation part, but even that happens differently). I don't intend to do another one after this, but who knows. Anyway, I already had in mind to do a puppy!Wade fic when I posted the kitty!Peter one. 
> 
> This one kind of went out of control. It's not as fluffy as you'd expect from such a trope. No, Wade is not mush in love with Peter, and they're both so angry and salty with each other-- I'm not even sure where all that came from. 
> 
> I also tweaked a bit with the trope. That being said, this was written with a happy ending in mind, but considering that Spideypool has so much anger directed at each other, I had to take my time and mend this.
> 
> Had no specific actor in mind for this Peter, so pick your own preference, if it fits.
> 
> Thank you, Noir, for beta reading this one! You're wonderful!

He doesn’t judge the distance well and the web shoots out only to fall down, so he experiences a long moment of vertigo before he shoots another line and this time it catches. 

He’s goddamn tired, that’s what he is.

Fighting criminals is like fighting the weeds in your backyard. When you finished all of it, it starts raining and in two days time it’s all back.

He rests for a minute on the brick wall, right next to his apartment window, just taking in the noise and the city fumes that will probably be what will send him to an early grave. If the bad guys don’t succeed.

Goddamn, he could sleep for a month.

But he won’t.

Instead he gets inside and promptly slips on a gummy toy that makes an infernal noise. Good thing he has spider reflexes that make him flip backwards and land on his feet.

He sighs. 

The culprit for his near death pushes the door to his bathroom open with his muzzle and comes bounding towards Peter in all his fluffy, yipping glory.

“Oh god,” he says, devoid of energy, “please tell me that you didn’t drink from the toilet.”

He picks the puppy up by the scruff and turns enough so that the moon rays can light the cream fur on his belly. The puppy doesn’t look wet around his mouth, so Peter sags, silently grateful that he won’t need to make a trip to the vet.

He places his unwanted stray on the unmade bed and takes off the mask, then the suit and sighs again. He should probably turn on the light, but he’s almost sleeping on his feet, so he better go and take a shower quickly before he falls down and sleeps on the clothes and toys covering the floor.

The pup’s little yips jolt him awake when he finds the perfect position under the hot waterfall, forehead propped on the warm tile, and he makes a mess of the bottles on the little iron shelf under the shower head. The new shampoo doesn’t make froth, so he scrubs with more vengeance, but nothing, and it’s viscous. Oh god, did he buy conditioner again? Why can’t they write ‘shampoo’ and ‘conditioner’ in big, bold letters on the damn bottles? He can’t be expected to always pay attention to what his hands do in a store, okay?

He gives up and pushes his head under the water to rinse the fresh-scented  _ whateveritis _ off his hair. At least he’s gonna have soft hair now. Or a bald head. 

The pup yips more insistently and he knows that if he doesn’t get out of the shower now, he’s gonna have to dry two bodies, not one. He almost falls to this death a second time when he steps out with one foot and it slides as if it’s ridiculous for Peter Parker to have nice, simple things in his life.

He catches himself with an elbow hugging the rim of the sink as his legs try to go for a split. With how dead to the world he is, he would fall asleep right there, but the tiles are cold as hell, so he pulls himself together.

“Pup, if you keep running around, I’ll seriously step on you,” he says, eyes mostly closed as he dries himself half-heartedly, the mass of fluff running around and between his legs, fur sliding over his ankles. “Please don’t make me clean guts off my tiles in the morning. It’s an early one. Have to—”

And he trails off as he zombie-walks himself the few steps to his bed and falls asleep before his body hits the mattress.

***

Wade stops yiping the moment Peter falls into his bed. With a sigh, he analyzes the mound of clothes and disarrayed covers for the easiest way to climb into the bed. Being a puppy is hard as fuck. He should’ve known better.

He climbs on, using little claws and teeth.

Once up there, he starts pulling the covers back up and over Peter’s starfish body using only his teeth and puppy determination. After covering his unwilling caretaker as best as a puppy can (he can’t do jack fuck about the leg that’s dangling over the edge), he makes sure that Peter can breathe properly with the way his face is squished into the pillow, and then makes himself comfortable with his furry ass pushed into Peter’s nape.

He sighs, muzzle on his front paws.

_ Don’t worry, baby boy. I’m gonna take care of you. _

He farts twice and hopes that the Chinese leftovers he ate hours ago won’t come back to bite him in the ass.

 

***

The alarm goes off too soon and Peter’s hand does what it knows best: flails and slaps things it can reach without eyes to guide it. 

The alarm doesn’t stop.

Then the little barks start and Peter groans and hates his life.

“Why are you still here?” he grumbles into his pillow.

Then groans some more, but in pain, as he wills his limbs to push his body up into a sitting position. Everything hurts, but thank god nothing is bleeding. He stares blankly at the ceiling until his vision is partially occupied by a blue-eyed spawn of hell, with triangular, fluffy ears, covered in that same cream fluff with a black spot enveloping his right, front paw.

Hell spawn.

The licking is not welcomed and not cute.

At all.

“Ugh! Stop it, you chubby little devil! Why didn’t you go away! Do what cats do: disappear, never to be seen again. Come back and visit me when I’m old and decrepit. Hah. If I can reach that age.”

He groans as he manages to hoist himself up, and do some stretching, but the alarm is so annoying that he webs it to the fridge along with a pair of boxers and a sweater. He continues with the stretching. Nothing that exerts his sore muscles more than necessary. He’s not a masochist. Doesn’t endorse physical or mental pain.

But apparently his other persona  _ loves it. _

Fucker.

He yawns.

Maybe he should take a break from the whole friendly neighborhood Spider-Man; all this saltiness might not be good for his health. Not when he refers to himself as having a double.

Stark naked, he goes to relieve himself, and when he returns, the hell spawn is sitting on the mattress, those little ears at attention and little tail wagging.

Evil comes in all shapes and sizes, and maybe little has become synonymous with it just like green did.

He pulls on a pair of boxers that look relatively clean and then goes into the kitchenette and dumps milk and cereal in a bowl. It takes a glance at his wrist watch to realize how late it is for him to start gobbling down half the bowl and then leaving it on the floor for the hell spawn to have at it as he searches for clean clothes. He’s expected at the Bugle in twenty minutes with new photos.

He’s at the shoes stage when he sees his backpack and reaches for it, one foot half into his sneakers, where it has been thrown near the half wall that separates the kitchenette from his front door, and promptly falls on his face.

“Shit,” he grumbles into the piece of clothing that somehow softened the fall, “I need to take a few days off. For real.” The puppy licks his forehead and hair, yipping. “Go away, you hell pup! Dunno why you’re still here. I don’t feed you and don’t scratch your belly. This is a hostile environment for you. Scram. Disappear.”

He picks himself up and checks to makes sure he has everything in his backpack, after which he goes out, locking the door behind him.

 

***

The chirpiness disappears from Wade’s chubby body, ears dropping.

_ I would. But I promised myself. In this body I can keep that promise. I want to do at least this thing. _


	2. Chapter 2

**_It all starts with a promise…_ **

Another one bites the dust.

No really, he does. The motorcycle Wade  _ borrowed  _ makes the idiot inhale fumes and dirt as Wade drives it into the first tree that comes into sight.

“Smell the fresh countryside air, Phil! It’s purifying!” He gathers himself up from where he jumped, dislocating a shoulder, and untwists his foot. “What was that? You’re not Phil? Damn, I thought I got your name right. Weren’t you the one screaming— oh! OH! Right, that was the other guy. The baldie. He screamed like a soprano. Ah, but you weren’t there. No, you were the idiot who interrupted my fun.”

He dusts his suit and approaches the wrecked motorcycle and the mangled body caught into the rear wheel.

“Well, you look worse for the wear, Paul. That was your name, wasn’t it? Hm, you look more like a Jack. ‘Cause you managed jack squat to kill me, eh? EH? Am I funny or what?” He cackles.

But there’s no humor in it. He takes out the crumpled piece of paper and a red crayon, and crosses  _ Baldie and Ollie  _ written in his handwriting. Underneath it there’s  _ witch’s house  _ with a drawing of a pointy house that wants to look like it’s made of biscuits and marzipan, but it looks like it’s made of small tornadoes and desert thistle. When he looks up behind the tree, a simple house with a front porch and a nice flower garden to the side greets him. The smoke is lifting up lazily from the chimney.

“Hot day for making a fire inside, ain’t it?”

In his little dancing hop, he heads for that house, his insides crippled by self-doubt, pain and suicide thoughts kept at bay  _ because daddy needs to work now. _

The little path leading to the house has a chest-high hedge on both sides and a blue mailbox with a little red handle. On the box there’s a number and a name. He looks at the crumpled piece of paper again. Underneath the  _ witch’s house  _ and the house drawing there’s a number and a name.

Wade whistles and takes out the mail from the box, then lets himself in.

No one stops him, not even when he kicks the door off, guns blazing.

The fire is licking at the logs and there’s a sweet smell wafting over from the kitchen where a hunched over person is working on something.

“Dorothy,” he says chirpy, then lowers his voice, pointing the guns at the old lady, “you’ve been a bad, bad girl. The Good Witch sends her regards.”

This is when Dorothy turns around, her aged face contorted into an ugly expression, eyes glinting as if she captured the fire in her dark, bottomless orbs.

“I’m the Good Witch,” she says, voice guttural and otherworldly, and flies over towards Wade.

“Shit-biscuits.”

She doesn’t make any physical contact. She doesn’t need to when she has magic aplenty. It takes her throwing Wade around the living room several times like a rag doll, for him to pull out from his pouch the singing bird box the Good Witch gave Wade when she contacted him. The moment the song starts playing, Dorothy screams herself hoarse as she is disintegrated and sucked into the box only for it to close itself and glow a yellow glow before settling down.

“Phew! Two jobs in one day. This must be my lucky day.”

He picks himself up and goes to the letters he left on the porch and takes the one with the blue sigil. He opens it and takes out a blank glossy paper, places it on the floor and then puts the box on top of it. In a matter of seconds the paper comes to life and its four corners envelop the box, then catches fire, the green flames turning everything to ashes. In its places, there’s a knee-high stack of money.

Wade takes fistfuls of notes and pushes them in all the pockets and little pouches he has. They’re not enough for how much he has there.

“Shit-dinkles. Should’ve told her to send the money into my account.”

With a sigh, he picks the more than half stack and dumps it into the hearth. The fire crackles and grows, before it peters out into nothingness. He dusts his hands and reholsters his guns when whispers make him turn on his heels guns pointing at whoever thought it was a good idea to sneak up on him.

No one is there. 

No, really. No one.

The whole house plunged into a tomb-like silence.

No witch, no birds, no wind, no life, eh?

But something calls to him. Something that’s not there. Climbing the two stairs into the kitchen, he saunters all the way to the other side of it where he has to take four steps down into a room that looks taken from medieval paintings. Or movies. The walls are made of earth and pail, same as the ground. There’s only wood, skulls, black candles, and dead animals around. 

But in the center of the room, on the old table, there’s an open book flanked by two black candles. Curious (and knowing what that book is used for), he goes and leafs through it.

Maybe there is a curse that can do away with his biggest problem: life.

Curse, curse, spell, curse, bring back dead people, love potions, king’s poison, curse, curse, curse.

Nothing important.

He turns and leaves, but the moment he takes a step, the pages turn as if prey to a wind that does not exist and when Wade looks, they settle down on a specific one.

He reads aloud the spell in a broken, stilted Latin because there’s a fancy creature on the adjacent page and something about forgetting about one’s self.

Well, he’s gonna take whatever he can to get away from his problem.

Nothing happens when he finishes reading it, so he leaves, snorting because of course he is cursed with something that has no twin curse that could annul it.

But as he leaves the house, a strange feeling assaults him and the whispering makes him look back only to be met by a yellow field.

Awesome. Where the fuck did the house or whatever kicked him go? He hopes he’s still in the right reality and state.

 

***

As it turns out, he was in the same place he arrived. The house simply disappeared, not being fueled by the witch’s magic.

Wade returns to New York like nothing happened and continues his mercenary work in a maniacal daze, not caring one iota about anything and anyone— least of all himself.

Until Spider-Man foils his plans of catching the jackass he was paid to kill. 

They fight.

Deadpool gets out bloody and with his body a mess.

Spider-Man takes home bruises and whistling ears.

That’s what he gets for being so close to Wade’s barrel as he aimed to shoot the kidney out of the escaping convict.

He gives Spider-Man a wide berth after that, although that ass is almost enough to make him come and pester the arachnid. Almost. His head is not a nice place from where words can come out, and besides his life is already a bloody, suicidal-tinged mess. No need to make new acquaintances that will leave him as soon as he starts talking.

He licks his wounds like he always did: alone with the tv to keep him company.

 

***

It doesn’t take long for their paths to cross again, and this time Deadpool actively tries to put a bullet through Spider-Man’s skull, because the girl he’s trying to kill pissed off Deadpool enough times to need to be unalived right now.

“Leave Cat Woman alone, Deadpool!” Spider-Man says from the wall he’s sticking to.

Wade empties one gun, trying to take the spider out of the picture.

“Why?” he says as he throws the gun away and aims with the other. “Because she’s in a love triangle with Batboy and his sidekick? Pass.”

He ends up covered in webs and sticking to the ceiling after Spider-Man throws him there— to Wade’s surprise because for a spry, annoying arachnid like him, he has the muscles of Juggernaut when he’s pissed off. Possibly more than that.

“If you wanted to see me covered in jizz, you should’ve asked, and I’d’ve refused,” he throws as Spider-Man, arms akimbo, stares at Wade. “What? Cat got your tongue?”

“Why did you try to kill her?”

“‘Cause she’s the villain in Batman’s story? No, wait. ‘Cause she’s a thief. Yes, that’s why. She steals. Stealing is bad. That’s what mommies teach their kids, right? Well mine didn’t, but I heard other mommies. Along with ‘don’t go near him’ or ‘he’s dangerous’ or ‘he has some disease, stay away from him’ or ‘take your hands off my girl’ or ‘what did you do to my baby?’. Well nothing, lady. Saved him and the damn cat from the tree. How in the hell can she be called a parent when she doesn’t watch what her kid’s doing?”

Spider-Man contemplates him for a long time and Wade might be falling asleep if he wasn’t already worked up into a rage. There’s so much anger boiling up, frothing to the surface, that it surprises his boxes into silence.

Then he’s pulled off of the ceiling and let down slowly, still covered in jizz. Webs continues to stare at him as if there’s a code smack bang in the middle of his forehead that he can’t decypher.

“She wasn’t on your hit list.”

“Wow, you know I have a hit list? What gives? Who ratted me out?”

“I followed you weeks ago, after we fought.”

“Stalker alert!”

“I can’t let you roam free in New York when you go kill people left and right.”

“Well all those people I  _ kill left and right  _ deserve it.”

“So what? You’re a vigilante now?”

“No, I’m the Merc who gets paid big bucks to take out criminals.”

Spider-Man sighs as if this conversation is getting him nowhere. Well, in a minute Wade will get Spidey somewhere off the building— as soon as he manages to cut through the webs, that is.

“Wade, you—”

He gasps. “You know my name!”

“You don’t exactly make it a secret, you know. Not when you say your name as if you’re James Bond.”

Another gasp. “You know my secret!”

Spider-Man sighs. “Again, your name is not much of a secret when you’re—” 

“No, meant that I binge-watched all the James Bond movies in creation.”

Spidey pauses. “I— didn’t know that.”

Yet another gasp, Spidey shakes his head, and Wade finally cuts through the damn webs and throws himself bodily into him.

It ends as well as Wade envisioned it: bound again. But this time the jizz tripled. This world is going to the dogs; people have no trust in others. He’s a trusty person. Ask the cat that got away. She surely trusted him to break every bone in her body. As slow as possible.

“I want to talk to you, Wade.”

“Already on a first name basis. Wow, Webhead, you’re reeeal chummy. I tried— am still trying to kill you. And you’re not on any list that’s directed at me. So this makes it personal.”

“And I stopped you. And I will stop you every time you’ll try.”

“Sorry, this is it for today for me. I’m tired after our scuffle. You have a mean right, you know? And you took away my knives and katanas. Way to get me naked— baby boy.”

Spider-Man sighs. “You’re very angry tonight. What happened?”

“Huh. Did I pay you to be my shrink and forgot when I last blew my brains out?”

Spidey is quiet for a long time and Wade feels like he’s going out of his mind trying to give the arachnid space to think and compartmentalize what came out of Wade’s mouth. It’s a hard pill to stomach, but he’s become so numb to other people’s feelings. So numb and  _ so done  _ with his own. If he could kill his sentimental side, he’d do it in a heartbeat. Oh, but wait. Someone did say at one point in his miserably long life that that’s exactly what keeps him teetering on the edge of gone and  _ goner.  _

He’s never been a  _ goner,  _ but he’s hella curious to know what that feels like.

“Look,” he begins, seeing as Spider-Man doesn’t give up. “You probably have other important shit you gotta do, so let me go and I won’t try to kill you. Now.”

Spider-Man snorts. “Right now you’re the ‘important shit I gotta do’,” he says, complete with the air quotes.

This guy, seriously. Is he for real?

Wade chuckles, despite the anger biting at his seams. “Then there’s something not right up there in your pumpkin’, if you waste time with me.”

“I’ll decide what’s wasted time.”

Wade stares at the arachnid, not knowing what to say to that, so, for once, he doesn’t say anything.

They talk, stilted and awkward at first, because Wade being Wade he turns everything into a sexual joke, but Spidey seems unfazed by that— or he’s plagued by a strong case of stubbornness. But what Wade hates about this guy is that he gets Wade to spill some of his guts. It’s because he listens and doesn’t make any judging comment or tells Wade that he needs help. He just listens.

And it’s not like he didn’t have people sit and listen to his woes in the past. Wiser and older people have done that for him. So there’s nothing special to this conversation; rather, it feels like relearning some steps he almost forgot: chit-chat that’s not meant to hide some feeling or other. He talks, Spidey listens, and he ends up feeling less angry at the end when Spidey takes off the jizz.


	3. Chapter 3

There’s that.

Next time Spidey meddles in his affairs, he manages to nip him above the knee, although he wanted to put the bullet through some vital point and be done with the vigilante.

But if things were going well before Spidey showed up, shit hits the fan after he hurts the arachnid. The thugs take out the heavy artillery and, for some reason, he ends up saving Spidey’s ass on top of his, but only because the guy saved his head from rolling like they do at the hand of the Red Queen. A head for a head. He doesn’t do owing someone favors. It’s much more satisfying to have people owe him.

He ends up patching up the guy’s leg and saying sorry.

Wow. What has become of him, Merc With A Mouth.

“Next time you butt in, I’ll kill you for real.”

He might be wrong, but he hears amusement when the guy says, “and I’ll stop you.”

He stares for a long time before he flings himself off the building.

 

***

“Y’know, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that you’re stalking me,” Wade says as he throws himself down on the edge of the building Spider-Man’s sitting on, eating a hamburger.

“You’re the one that came to me, so I’m not sure who’s stalking who.”

“Fine. It’s a mutual stalking, Andrew Thompson.”

Spidey throws him a look, chewing the bite, then taking another one.

“No? Matt Rodriguez.”

The guy stares.

“Martinez?”

“What?”

“Garçon? Pirinelli? Schwarm? Tomlison? Marquis?”

Spidey swallows the last bite. “Are you trying to guess my name?”

“I know! Hank McCoy! No, wait, that’s the Beast. Messing with the realities here. Hmm, so what’s your name?”

As if he doesn’t know already, but he wants to hear the man tell him himself.

“Not gonna tell you.”

“Oh, c’mon Spidey, you know mine, and I’m not killing you. At least not right now.”

A rare chuckle escapes the man before he pulls down his mask.

“Not a chance.”

“Why? Because you’re a hero and you don’t want villains to come barging down in your Spidey Cave?”

“Something like that.”

“Aw, scout’s honor I won’t tell anyone.”

“Still no.”

“Party pooper.”

“So why’re you here? Usually, I need to be the villain in your story.”

Wade gasps and clutches his heart. “Bull’s eye, Webhead! You’re the villain in my story. Nah, I have no reason to be here. Or there. Or anywhere. I just am.”

Spidey is silent for a long time, and Wade’s oddly comfortable to share the silence as the sun is halfway down the horizon.

“So will you ever tell me what’s plaguing you?”

“Apart from immortality and healing powers to top Wolvie’s? Nothing much.”

“Did you kill anyone today?”

“Why? Will you tell me off if I did?”

Spidey simply stares and waits Wade out.

“I didn’t. The day’s only begun for me.”

“So I need to watch you the whole night.”

“Dunno, Webhead, can you? Because I’m a trained ninja. I can and will disappear right from under your nose.”

Spidey huffs. “Okay. Disappear.”

“Right now?”

“Yeah.”

Wade shakes his head, unable to keep the staredown, not when Spidey has that arm propped on his hip and looking at Wade as if he expects him to pull a white rabbit out of his ass.

He might be able to pull that one off— if he messes with time travel and realities at the same time. But that would hurt his butt hole, and he’s not a masochist— okay, not  _ that  _ kinda masochist. Besides, he wouldn’t go through the ordeal just to do one simple trick.

Spidey pushes himself to a crouching position out of the blue, looking intently at something down below.

“What? Your Spidey senses are tingling? Some poor schmuck is robbing a bank or what?”

“Not sure,” he says, scanning the area. “Will have to check.” He turns his attention towards Wade. “Promise me you won’t kill anyone tonight.”

Wade snorts. “Not gonna promise that.”

“Wade.”

“Brandon.”

“That’s not my name.”

“Your would-be criminals are probably making their big escape by now. Are you sure you have time to waste on a promise I won’t keep?”

He looks down at the city again, as if weighing down something.

“Still, I want you to promise me that you won’t kill anyone tonight.”

“You’re fighting a lost cause, you know that, right? No amount of promises and mindless chit-chat will make it right in my noggin’.”

Spidey sighs as if he’s running out of patience. “I’m not trying to cure you or save you from whatever it is that plagues you. I’m simply trying to be your friend.”

“Tell me something, Spider-boy. Do you go making friends with every baddie that wants to kill you?”

“No.”

“So, you admit that I’m special.”

“I gotta go.”

Wade cackles as Spider-Man flings himself off and shoots a line. 

“Can’t believe you pulled a Cap throwing himself off from the plane to not talk about his feelings, Spidey!” he shouts after the disappearing vigilante.

 

***

He’s watching Spidey do his superhero stint, a delicious chimichanga in one hand. He doesn’t cheer or make any comment. For all he knows, no one is aware that he’s there, atop a stack of containers. Spidey is fighting Doc Ock and the Green Goblin. Who knew that those two knew each other. Probably their profiles matched on Tinder.

He’s enjoying the fight, but then the Lizard Man shows up and Spidey is straining to keep up with the Triad.

Wade leaves the chimichanga on the edge of the stack of containers he’s sitting on and pulls down his mask. He takes out the guns and counts the bullets he has, then puts them back in their holsters. Something familiar bubbles to the surface, masked by the calm movements, coiling and prowling inside like it wants to  _ pounce  _ and  _ maim  _ indiscriminately.

Ock throws Spidey into the third container out of the four Wade’s sitting on, making a deep indent into the metal. Wade pulls his legs back some more and leans forward.

“Need help, Webhead?”

“Only if you’re not busy.”

Wade hoists himself up and pulls out the guns just as the creepy laugh of the Goblin becomes louder and louder as the green goo comes charging towards him on his flying plate.

“Right now I have all the time in the world.”

He lets himself fall, and Spidey shoots two lines, one catching beneath Goblin’s flying doormat, and the other catching Deadpool, so that he makes a nice arc charged with bullets.

They only catch the Lizard Man, but he has a healing factor, and Doc Ock’s tentacle porn protects him. Time to get out the big guns.

He chops Lizard Man into pieces and throws him into the sea. But just as he turns around to get the chopping on the second jackass, blue and red hit him in the face and they both plunge deep into the sea.

When Wade manages to drag Spidey to the surface, ways off from the dock, he thinks he won’t need to take a shower for a month. He tells Spidey just that, but there’s no answer from him. Then an unfamiliar feeling settles in and before he names it, he’s pulling up the mask enough to have access to his mouth and does CPR and chest compressions until Spidey coughs up the salty water he ingested.

“Don’t ever scare me like that!” Wade says in a rare bout of raw honesty.

“I’ll try,” Spidey says, still coughing, but at least he’s sitting up and breathing.

“I’m sure next time you’ll kick their butts. I mean, I can track them down and unalive them myself, if you ask me, free of charge, but I know you won’t.”

“Don’t do it.”

“Hey, I only suggested.”

“I know you, Wade. Don’t go and kill them.”

Wade frowns behind the mask. “Why? They’re evil. They need to go.”

“Following your line of thought, you’d be right there with them.”

Silence.

“Well, glad we had this chit-chat.” 

He gets up and dusts off the sand that sticks to his wetsuit anyway.

“Wade.”

“John.”

Spidey groans, sighs, and gets up. “Name’s Peter. Happy now?”

“I know my mask doesn’t show it, but right now I’m grinning.”

“I can hear it.”

“Must be a side-effect of those Spidey senses. Now you’re hearing things you only see.”

“Need a lift?”

“Why, I actually do, my fair sir!”

Spidey brings Wade close to his side, shoots a line, pulls and they’re off, flying between the New York buildings.

“So where does Spidey-Peter live?”

“You won’t let that one go.”

“Why would I?”

They land on the roof of a ten storey building.

“Wade, you saved my life, so I trusted you with my name. Don’t make me regret it.”

Wade contemplates him for a while, then sighs. “Fine. I won’t say your name unless we’re alone or something.”

“Promise me?”

He stares at the big, milky eyes, thinking back at the fight, at the feeling, at every encounter they had until now. Strange how the anger and resentment that fueled his actions up until now are nowhere in sight. He doesn’t feel compelled to lie or joke. Spidey sounds like he wants him to be genuine. But does he still have it in him? Didn’t genuinity die the moment he became this walking and talking monster?

Maybe.

Yet Spidey is still here, still waiting. He’s never met a guy that had this much patience— not with him. Past encounters with old people notwithstanding.

“Promise.”

Spidey nods, pleased with the answer and shoots a web before he swings himself away from Wade.

Watching the man disappear down the street, another change occurs within Wade’s mind. Small, and not that important. It’s nothing he never did or vowed to himself before— with people he cared about.

“Promise I’ll protect you.”

And for the first time, those words hold only truth. The vow sears itself around his heart and the curse activates.

 

***

Unbeknownst to Wade, the curse he read aloud is the same one that transformed Dorothy into the Wicked Witch.

It doesn’t transform the person into a demonic creature. That is simply what the first person to ever pronounce those words got the shape of.

It’s a curse that starts with a vow fueled by strong feelings. 

The breaking of such a curse is what nobody ever managed to find out, and with the passing of time, they forgot who they really were, and died in that form.


	4. Chapter 4

He keeps saying that he’s going to take a day or two off from his superhero work, but that work keeps pulling him away from his deserved break like stray dogs do with a loaf of stale bread.

The puppy is still there when he stumbles into his dark apartment, wagging his tail and barking as if Peter is the highlight of his day— night. He feels guilty for leaving the pup alone the whole day, but he also feels sore and bruised. Until he steps into something cold and gooey.

“No,” he whispers, “please don’t be what I think—”

The smell is unmistakable. Wonderful. Just what he desired to find when he came back home.

“Why did you…” He won’t even bother asking, because he knows that nobody will answer him.

Though, really now. Isn’t his life hard and complicated enough? Does the universe or whoever is out there think that he can deal with a dog? A dog that’s not potty trained, that is.

“Okay, that’s it. Tomorrow we’re going training,” he says as he hops towards the bathroom to take a shower, but before that he throws Spider-Man suit into the washing machine along with some dark clothes and turns it on.

He sighs when he comes back in his boxers and wrinkled tee, and the puppy is yipping and chasing his tail as if he’s so happy that Peter emerged from the bathroom. He cleans up the nasty surprise before he picks the hell spawn up and cradles him in the crook of his elbow as he gets into the bed and pulls the covers over both of them, pup at his chest, the wet nose pushed into his collarbone.

“Just so you know,” he slurs, halfway asleep, “I hate you.”

 

***

Wade cannot comprehend why he’s so happy that Peter will ‘potty train’ him tomorrow. He’s a fucking adult! He knows how and where to shit, but he can’t use the toilet like a fucking normal person in this body, can he now?

Never mind. At least Peter is determined to take a break, even if it’s at Wade’s expense.

He also needs to tell his owner his name so he can stop being ‘puppy’ or ‘devil thing’ or ‘hell spawn’. Really, he’s not  _ that  _ bad. Okay, maybe he pooped on the exact spot he knew his Spidey would step on when he came back, and maybe that toy was also placed strategically— and maybe Wade destroyed the first Spidey suit, but the guy seriously needs a break. All that vigilante stint was taking a nasty toll on the scrawny dude.

But if being a pesky puppy makes Peter do what he keeps saying he’s going to do, then he’ll become the second coming of the Antichrist if he has to.

With a deep sigh, Wade makes himself comfortable at Peter’s chest.

_ I know. It’s okay to hate me. At least that makes you do shit, Parker. So hate me all you want as long as you take care of yourself in the meantime. _

He never thought that this was going to become his life. From Merc With A Mouth to Spidey’s puppy maid— caretaker. Something.

But this Parker is so bad at keeping promises that are directed at himself. His fucking spider sense tingles that morning and he jumps up as if Wade developed bee stings all over his body.

_ Oh, no. Not this time, Parker. _

He’s barking like mad, even though Spidey ignores him all through taking on the stupid suit. 

_ So it’s the big guns. ‘Kay. _

Just when Peter heads for the window, Wade jumps off the bed, stumbling down on his muzzle, but he’s a pup on a mission and nothing will stop him from biting at Peter’s ankle.

“What the hell?!”

Wade bites the material and then pulls and it— tears off. The whole heel portion just comes off, and they both freeze, Wade with the material dangling from one of his little canines, and Peter staring down at him as if he just became a three-headed beast in the blink of an eye.

“You— did you— wow, real smooth, you…”

He falls on his ass and passes his palms over his face, sighing loudly, and thumping his head against the wall.

“Are you for fucking real?” he shouts out of the blue, just as Wade was approaching him with caution.

The sudden rise in the decibels jolts Wade and he surries off behind the falling cover, under the bed.

“Oh, no.” A hand pulls Wade out by one leg, to his expressed whines, before the second hand picks him up by the scruff and even his pathetic wimpers don’t deter Peter from opening his front door. “You’re out!”

But he hesitates, hand stretched out to presumably let Wade fall down. This gives Wade time to employ the biggest gun he possesses: puppy eyes.

“No, you don’t get to use puppy eyes on me, you little devil! You destroyed my reserve! How am I supposed to do my work, now?”

_ You don’t. You take the fucking break and take care of yourself. Sleep like a normal human being. Eat three meals, and clean your fucking dump, Parker. You broke my fucking nose, dumbass. I keep smelling pickles and I know that you hate them. _

It’s in moments like these that Wade wishes to return back to his human form and shout all those things in the fucker’s face. This apathetic attitude towards himself is pissing Wade off like nothing else ever did! Why is it so hard for this kid to keep himself healthy? Jesus on a bobby trap in Afghanistan!

But he doesn’t anticipate the moment Peter pulls him back inside, shuts the door loudly and then tosses Wade into the bed. He gets to yip once before he’s bouncing almost off the bed, if he didn’t scramble his paws on the blanket to push himself up on the mattress.

_ Oh MY GOD! I SWEAR I’M GONNA FUCKING KILL YOU THE MOMENT I GET MY PAWS ON A GUN, YOU FUCKER! _

The barks, though fueled by anger, do nothing to the man that throws Wade an unimpressed cocked eyebrow as he changes into street clothes. Denim, tee, and a hoodie over it.

_ Don’t fucking touch me, Parker!  _ He’s screaming in his mind as Peter lifts him by the scruff once again.  _ I swear I’m gonna shit on all your clothes and pee on your fucking pillow, if you throw me  _ **_one more time!_ **

Oh, he can growl! Good to know. He growls and barks and Peter only snorts as he dumps Wade’s ball of gorgeous fluff into his backpack.

_ Real smooth, Parker. What am I? Your trophy wife you can pull out and put back on the shelf? You fucker! _

“Zip it, if you want to come with me,” Peter says, lifting Wade with a palm on his stomach this time, to place a towel at the bottom of the backpack. 

He bites Peter’s index finger, feeling his canines sink in just a little bit.

_ “OUCH!  _ Why the hell did you do that?” He’s sucking his finger as he frowns something fierce down at Wade.

Well, he ain’t  _ just  _ a rainbow of fluff and cutesy. He can  _ bite.  _ Case in point.

“Oh, you’re done!”Peter says, voice lowering and coming out cold and full of venom. “So done! I’m leaving you on the street.” He stands up, blotches of red peppering his cheeks. “I’m so fucking done with you! You’re out. This time for good!”

Wade growls at him, pushing his butt up and almost lying his front on the towel as if he’s ready to pounce and attack Peter when the growls give way to whimpers and the shaking starts. For some odd reason the idea of being abandoned shakes him to the core, as if he’s been abandoned countless times already.

His little paws cover his eyes as his shaking butt falls down, unable to stop himself from whimpering.

It takes several moments to hear a defeated sigh and then have hands lift him up only for Wade to stare back at a tired Peter and maybe— his eyes might be seeing too much, be that might be sadness and loneliness he’s seeing there.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, “didn’t mean what I said. Won’t leave you out on the street.”

Wade whimpers a bit and Peter places him back down in his backpack, leaving him to watch Peter as he takes his wallet, phone and keys and then zips the backpack up to the corners, letting Wade’s head and paws out. Then he places the backpack over his front instead of his back and they’re out.

What he didn’t expect is the assault of scents his nose picks up once in the street. At a certain point, he simply takes shelter inside the backpack to breathe in the smell of Peter on the towel. 

“What’s that? Too much for you?” Peter says from above, looking down at Wade yawning and making himself comfortable at the bottom of the backpack.

There’s a small smile on his lips at that.

_ Fucking finally a smile, Parker. You really make a man work for that. _

They make a pit stop at a dog store where he buys a roll of dog poop bags and some dog food that he stashes in the backpack with Wade. He wrinkles his nose when he smells the package, something synthetic and totally not real meat. Who do they test this shit on? Certainly not humans.

It’s when Peter places him down that Wade graces the world with the cutest mug he could be bestowed with. They’re in a park, the sunny, warm day having drawn out a crowd with a lot of mutts. Wonderful. He expects to have lots of noses in his ass. His tongue passes over his small, but pointy canines. He’s prepared to retaliate.

He lets Peter take him out and place him on the grass.

“Now you can shit and pee all you want. This is a free for all space. Also, I’m prepared.” He picks out the small roll and places it in his hoodie’s front pocket.

Wade sits his ass on the grass and looks up at Peter. He ain’t gonna socialize with other dogs. He’s only interested in socializing with one infuriating human who is throwing him befuddled looks.

“What? Do you want to play?”

Wade shakes his head. First time he’s been asked a direct question. It’s good that it’s a yes or no question. Peter blinks, pauses for a long time, staring at Wade again in that weird way as if  _ Wade’s  _ the weird one here. Well, he might be, but he’s used to seeing and hearing  weirder shit than a dog shaking his head.

“Are you… hungry?”

Head shake.

“Can you understand me?”

Nod.

Peter leans back on the bench, not taking his eyes off of Wade.

“Wow. Okay. Can you talk?”

Wade pauses. He never really tried to form words with the new mouth and vocal chords, so he tries saying Peter, but what gets out is “wowow”, so he shakes his head. Peter laughs, and Wade finds himself wagging his little cute tail. It’s the first time he can talk about himself and use ‘cute’ as the main descriptor. He hopes he’ll never grow up from this fluffy ball of wonder and joy. He’s fabulous!

Peter considers him. “Were you a human who got transformed into a pup?”

There’s a guarded look on Peter’s face at that, and Wade finds himself hesitating. Telling him that would mean having Spidey try to find a cure for this, which means going on a searching spree and not be home to take care of himself. But on the other hand, telling him that he was a human before might not spook him or have him toss Wade out on his ass. Or worse, leaving him somewhere so he can be rid of this problem.

He cocks his head, a compromise between yes and no.

“Human? Like me, I mean,” he says, indicating his face then whole body.

Wade inclines his head on the other side.

“So no human. Are you an alien?”

He shakes his head. Better to eliminate that possibility right off the bat.

“What are you, then?”

Wade looks down at the grass, unable to meet Peter’s eyes.  He falls silent after that, staring out at the people milling about in the park, some strolling, others playing with their dogs, others still running.

“What’s your name?”

He cocks his head up, but this time stands on all his four, barking his name.

“Right, you can’t talk. Hmm, can you show me if I give you letters?”

Wade nods. That he can do. He might not be able to hold a pen in his paws, but he can move letters into a row.

“Okay. Let’s see where can we do that—” his eyes scan the park, and then he jumps to his feet.

He opens his backpack and waits, this time, for Wade to step inside, then zips the sides and puts it on. The place he had in mind turns out to be the public library, and Wade doesn’t understand until Peter tells him to be quiet and stay still. He zips the backpack all the way before they enter and then it’s a game of waiting and keeping as still as possible, but all the jostling and the questionable breakfast he found that morning kind of upsets his stomach.

He’s unable to keep it in anymore, so he farts. He intends it to be a silent one, but it sounds as if he grabbed the neck of a balloon and pulled in opposite sides to let the air make that screeching, irritating sound. 

Whoops.

Several ‘shh’ filter through the thin material of the backpack, along with Peter’s quiet ‘sorry’, and Wade hopes against hope that the trip will be done within the next handful of seconds because otherwise he’s gonna die suffocated by his own fart.

He always imagined his death to be in a fight or at the hand of Death, not in a puppy shape killed by his own gases.

When Peter opens the backpack, he has to lean back and flutter a hand as Wade pushes out his head and breathes in stuffy, library air.

“Oh god, what happened there?” he whispers, wrinkling his nose.

_ Time bomb going off, Parker. Don’t tell me you never had those. Or do you fart and fairies come out sprinkling glitter? _

He notices, after the stink evaporates, that he’s in a very colorful section of the library. He never knew this existed. Usually, libraries are all black and brown and people hunched over books. The place they’re in has toys and colorful books— and no soul in sight. He looks at Peter as the man stretches over to one side and pulls a wicker chest full of Lego blocks. It takes a moment for Wade to understand what he’s doing as he selects colorful letters out of it and places them on the rug.

Wade gets into action in no time, pushing away the letters he won’t be using, but hesitating after a handful. If he tells Peter his name, he won’t take long to put two and two together, not when Deadpool has been conspicuously missing from Peter’s usual patrols.

So what he does is pull three letters and arrange them in a row. He better remember this one so he can answer to it when Peter will call him.

“Dae? Really. Your name is Dae.”

Wade nods.

“And you’re sure you’re not from another planet?”

Head shake.

He sighs. “Fine,  _ Dae.” _

“Sir, you’re not allowed with pets in here,” a willowy man says from behind the shelves, arms crossed.

They both jolt at the appearance of such a character and Peter pushes Wade in the backpack, hurrying out of the library before the man decides to fine him for breaking the rules.

They return home before the rain hits. Peter lets Wade out of the backpack and he takes out the dog food, pouring some in a bowl and placing it near the bed. Wade doesn’t even look at it.

“Don’t tell me you don’t like dog food.”

Wade shakes his head.

“Wonderful. Wasted money. Then what do you eat?”

He goes and sits in front of the fridge. Peter cocks an eyebrow.

“You mean you eat human food, but you weren’t a human?”

Wade simply stares back at Peter. It’s easier to keep a poker face when you don’t have enough facial muscles to do more than that and a dog smile. Peter sighs and pulls out several ingredients. 

_ Aw, no, Spidey’s gonna cook for me? I feel so special! _

But the bowl that Peter puts in front of him contains half a slab of minced meat.

Wade looks up at a Peter who has an expectant look on his face, arms akimbo. Okay, he can do a deadpan, I’m-so-done face alongside his poker one. He’s sure of it. This is it.

_ Are you fucking pulling my leg, Parker? I can’t eat this uncooked shit. At least boil it and put some salt in. Make it edible, for fuck’s sake! _

“What? Raw meat not to your liking?” The damn fucker says, unable to mask the amusement. “Why, Your Royal Highness, Mr.  _ Dae,  _ if that is even your real name, this is premium meat on this planet. The best of the best. And being the best of the best, it needs to be served cold, untampered.”

Wade growls, pissed at the snark. Peter snorts and rolls his eyes. 

“If you wanna eat cooked food, you’ll have to wait for this one.”

He takes the bowl and dumps the meat in a bigger one alongside the other half. Wade cocks his head, smelling some spices, raw meat, and eggs. Is he going to do meatloaf? He can cook that shit?

He barks once, to pull Peter’s attention towards him.

“Yeah, yeah, I heard you. Meatloaf. It needs to bake for a while, so sit your fluffy ass down and wait.”

When he shapes the meat into a loaf, he puts it on a tray and pushes it into the pre-heated oven, setting it for an hour. Then he looks around at the messy room and pulls back his sleeves. 

_ Oh, it’s cleaning time already? Why, I didn’t notice there was anything to clean in this pigsty. _

But at the end of the cleaning, Wade’s impressed. It took Peter less than half an hour to bring the main room to a shine. He even dusted and put the trash bin out to be taken down when he goes out. Granted, the majority of the clothes got dumped in the dirty clothes chest after a perfunctory sniff test. The only problem is that he also made the bed so now he can’t get on it because there’s nothing he can climb on and his tummy would like something soft to lie on.

So he barks, because Peter is the nearest thing he has that can take him from point A to point B.

“What? What’re you barking at?” Peter says, his head popping up from the bathroom, one yellow gloved hand keeping a window cleaner bottle at an angle.

Wade runs towards the bed and sits down, then barks once.

“Really? Right now?”

Nod.

“Fine. You have to wait for me to finish here. Unless you’d like to have chemicals in your fur.” He shows his other gloved hand in a menacing way and Wade sighs and lies down on his stomach, waiting for that lift.

And he’s kept waiting. From the looks of it, the irritating man is doing it on purpose, going so far as to scrub the fucking tiles in the shower. 

_ Who even does that shit nowadays? The stuff is gonna be back next time you shower. Annoying arachnid. _

After hours of agony for Wade, Peter gets out of the bathroom, places the gloves under the kitchen sink and then washes his hands. Good, Wade’s nose wouldn’t be able to stand the chemical smell. Not that perfumed liquid soap is better, but at least it’s not a pungent smell.

Peter places him on the made bed, Wade going in circles for a bit to find his own spot, and when he does Peter boops his nose. There’s a sort of confused yelp that gets out of his mouth at the shock of that action, and Peter chuckles as he goes to check on their food.

_ Brat. _

He passes his paws over his muzzle multiple times, licking his nose afterwards to keep it moist, then settles down to take a nap. He’s growing up; he needs lots of naps and food. And the smell of meat wafting over is divine. But first a nap.

“Lunch will be ready in twenty.” He hears Peter say, but it’s distant as he finally relaxes.

Time passes, diluted and poisoned by nasty dreams of a nightmarish shadow giving him chase, red orbs smudging as he comes bounding towards him, but what brings him back is a strong meatloaf smell that rouses his snout from his paws to take in as much of that as possible.

“Wake up, hell spawn. Your lunch is ready, but still too hot to eat.”

When he opens his eyes, Peter is sitting on his bed, Spider suit pooling over his legs. He’s mending the bit Wade tore off earlier. He growls, and his stomach rivals his mouth because the bowl is right under his nose, but Wade has bigger fish to fry.

“Zip it, fluff ball. I took today off to be just Peter. Can’t take tonight off. Criminals won’t take a break just because I’m not around. I need to be out there and fight them off. So no growling or any other surprises for when I come back, okay? Or you’ll be eating raw meat for the rest of your life.”

His growls die down into an uncertain sound, then he starts eating his share. Before he knows it, he gobbles down everything and licks the bowl clean. 

_ Damn, that hit the spot! _

When Peter goes out that night, Wade simply sighs and makes himself comfortable on the right side of the pillow reserved for him as he watches with dull eyes how Spidey goes off to put his life in danger. Again.

What can a puppy do to impede such a thing? Nothing, that’s what. Wade tried. Motherfucker, did he try everything he could think of.


	5. Chapter 5

The last thing Peter expects after several nights of fighting off crime is to hear that familiar growl as he’s trying to get away from the little rockets launched towards him. It takes him a split second to see the hell spawn running towards the criminal armed to the teeth, intent on chewing him off, probably.

“Oh god, no!” 

He swings himself around the bullets and mini-rockets, but a bat hits him in the stomach and  _ oh fuck,  _ he forgot about the beast and his faithful huge bat. The impact with the concrete wall is not welcomed in the least, and he has to take a few precious moments to get the dizziness under control and make sure that he didn’t break anything important.

But he’s out and into the fray when he hears the hell spawn’s cries of pain and the two criminals trying to take him out of the picture. He manages to swing by and take Dae off to land on another building, not far from the one where they were fighting.

“What are you doing here? Are you crazy?! Go back home, you’re gonna die here!”

But the hell spawn is barking and growling at him like he’s possessed. And then the rocket explodes and Peter’s thrown off on the other side of the rooftop because he’s an idiot and turns his back to armed criminals just because his heart almost stopped in his chest at the sight of the puppy.

His limbs are uncooperative, and he’s left to watch how the two haul themselves over to this rooftop. The stocky guy swings the bat and Dae flies off into the staircase door, falling down the stairs, and Peter thinks that this is it. This is how he dies.

The criminals are upon him and Peter closes his eyes, giving in to his sore muscles, but a much louder and fuller growl makes him open them only to see a flurry of black take both criminals out, no matter how much they shoot and scream.

When Peter manages to push himself up, he can only see a blob of darkness and a lot of blood on the other side of the rooftop. He takes reluctant steps towards the growling mass of long, moving fur, stripes of white covering the entirety of the body, and when the creature turns his bloody, pointy muzzle towards Peter, two red orbs greet him along with blood dripping down from white teeth. Strong claws adorn his paws, the front ones soaked in blood and bits of flesh clinging to the sides. 

It’s a grotesque picture, but then a whine escapes the creature, his whole body shaken by an internal tremor. When he moves back, Peter notices that it’s the long, really long, strands of fur coming from the neck and the tail, that make the hound-like creature seem bigger than it really is, reaching just below Peter’s chest. 

But there’s something wrong with it as it wobbles to the side, as if prey to dizziness and the dark fur changing color, the white, front paw from which the white stripes seem to sprout transforming to something without claws, naked.

And before Peter can blink, the creature shifts completely into a scarred, familiar man.

“Wade?”

Blood covers his hands, face and chest as he groans where his back is propped to the concrete wall.

“Spidey…”

Peter is right there, keeping him from falling over, but the moment he ascertains that Wade’s still alive and breathing, if unconscious, bones rearrange themselves and fur grows back.

 

*** 

When he opens his eyes, his muzzle is on his front paws and Peter’s smell calms his rabbit heart. He’s home and safe. What he did— what happened was only a dream. Lifting his head, he spies Peter doing the dishes. He yawns and stretches on his front paws, butt in the air. It’s a cute butt, so he wiggles it just because he can.

“I see you woke up,” Peter says and there’s something in his voice that’s kept at bay, masked.

Wade cocks his head. The soft grey sweater and black lounge pants makes him look scrawny, though he knows there are lean muscles under those clothes. He licks his nose. Peter sits on the bed, and Wade can’t read anything on his face, but the gut feeling tells him that something bad is headed his way.

“How are you feeling, Wade?”

_ Shit! How did he—? _

“Oh, you’re confused. You’re wondering how I know your name.”

Wade blinks, then nods reluctantly.

“Do you remember what happened yesterday?”

He looks at the faded turquoise blanket. Something happened yesterday? He shakes his head.

“Well, let me get you up to speed: you followed me when I went out, pretty sure you hid in my backpack, then wanted to take on two  _ armed  _ criminals that were shooting at you — I thought I was going to have a heart attack —  and  _ then  _ you transformed into a huge black beast and killed them. I— I’m not sure you didn’t eat some—”

Peter shakes his head, as if to shrug off a nasty image. But it is. This is so horrifying that Wade lets his jaw fall slowly down. No dream, no. It was all real. He— really did that. Transformed into a beast thirsty for blood. Only the smell, that smell broke the haze. Peter’s familiar scent. 

He swallows, and wants to mouth ‘I’m sorry’, but he can’t, so he whines and lies down, paws covering his eyes.

The sigh makes him peek from between his crossed paws. Peter’s fixing a point somewhere on the floor.

“I’m not… I don’t even know what I feel right now, but I’m not mad or angry with you. I just want to know what happened to you. Why are you a puppy and why were you that— black hound? I just want answers, but I won’t force them out of you, if you don’t want to give them to me. Just— I want to help you get back to your human form, if I can. So if you know how, please let me know. Tomorrow I’ll buy letters so we can communicate.”

Tomorrow comes and Wade doesn’t reveal a cure or more answers because he simply doesn’t have them. But he does tell Peter what happened and how the house doesn’t exist anymore. It takes Wade hours to say everything, even with abbreviations and Peter asking questions.

Peter is silent afterwards and Wade gives him the space. He chooses to sleep in the basket Peter uses to take the wet clothes to the drying rack.

 

***

There’s no cure.

It’s cemented in Wade’s cells, even if Peter spends the next days researching the Internet, and when that doesn’t offer any solution, he spends an entire day at the library. Wade has to get creative to get to food. It’s shitty. Shitty situation; shitty body; shitty— 

The jingle has his little ears pricked up, intent on the door, but the sounds are wrong, not quite keys. 

_ Is someone picking the lock?! _

That— that’s almost a fucking joke. But the thought is there. Someone’s picking at the lock and a growl is building up in his cute, tiny chest until the growls become deeper and fuller and when he steps forward, a white, clawed paw pushes at the edge of his vision.

_ Hell yes! Puppy upgrade just in time to shred the fucker to pieces! _

His upper half lowers, preparing himself to pounce on the motherfucker.

The door opens and Peter walks in with two plastic bags on one forearm, along with the keys, an eco-friendly bag cradled in the crook of his the other arm and the phone in his mouth. There are words that Peter’s saying, muffled by technology, and Wade’s growls die down. He cocks his head and watches as Peter places the bags down and shuts the door with his foot.

“You transformed!”

_ Yeah, tell me something new, Webhead. _

“And you’re… not attacking.”

If Wade could, he’d roll his eyes so hard right now.

“Though those eyes are still freaky. Like… hella freaky. Can you change them to something less like it comes from a crappy horror movie?”

Wade hopes his new face expresses how done he is right now. But it passes because Peter’s approaching him, the steps reluctant, as if prepared to jump away if Wade so much as moves wrong. It doesn’t sit well with him. He fucking  _ protected _ their home! He’d like to ask Peter how many of his  _ friends  _ have done that up until now. 

Oh wait, Peter Parker doesn’t have friends. He seems to prefer solitude to human interaction (beating bad guys doesn’t count). The idea is amusing for some reason and he snorts, which makes the hand that was reluctantly heading his way freeze. 

With a huff, Wade pushes into it with more aggressiveness than the situation might call for, and Peter steps back lightning fast. The growl is low and not threatening. He needs to express his frustration somehow, okay?

“Okay, sorry,” Peter says, staring at Wade with calculating eyes, before he bends and picks up the bags to place them on the small kitchen counter. “I didn’t mean— well, I did. You look… fluffy. And like you could do with some h—”

He yelps.

And yes, it  _ is  _ a manly yelp, despite this scrawny dumbass’ age, but Wade  _ has  _ to show him that he really didn’t mind the touch. And he’d like more, so he does what cats do: he fucking drags his side against Peter’s back, then he makes space for his head under his arm and sighs because Webhead needs to know how stupid he’s being right now with all that reluctance.

_ Didn’t I tell ya that Imma kill ya sorry ass? Still gonna do it. But pet me in the meantime, and I might not kill you as dead as I’d like to. _

“O-oh, okay, so you want to be petted. Or is this a bad case of attention seeking that you’ve been holding up on me?”

Wade huffs at the little amused smile he directs down at Wade, but then he scrunches up his nose, much more sensitive than his puppy one at the onion smell coming from the nearest bag. He tolerates it only because Peter  _ finally  _ decides to pet him the way he should’ve.

“How did you manage to transform into this… hound? Also, your fur is so damn smooth. I could OD on this, running my fingers through your coat.”

He huffs yet again. Sentimental fool. Not that he isn’t one himself, but he isn’t  _ this  _ easy. He leaves Peter’s side to use the letters left on the floor near the bed, where he explains why he’s like this.

“Hm, so fear triggers—” The growl is warning enough, yet Peter rolls his eyes. Right now Wade’s pissed at him for being able to do such a simple action. “Okay, anger triggers this form. But you’re pretty calm now. Why aren’t you turning back to your human form?”

That has Wade cock his head at Peter.

“You don’t remember? You became you for like two seconds before you returned to a puppy. Really, Wade, what kind of curse did you put on yourself? I found nothing at the library.”

Wade thinks. He thinks and thinks, and gets a headache for his effort. But the headache comes with an idea. He writes the name of the only person who could help them with this, and Peter’s eyebrows were either becoming animated and climbing up towards peaks never before reached or he flexed those particular facial muscles so much that they’re elastic now.

“You’re joking, right? That’s— that’s a story. It’s— okay.” He sighs; apparently the new face has a mighty deadpan look in its repertoire that makes Peter backpedal.  _ Nice. _ “Fine. Let’s say that I believe you for a second. How do we reach— the Good Witch?”

Wade provides.

“Of course we call her. Why didn’t I think about this before? The Good Witch has a phone.” Wade rearranges letters as Webhead continues on his soliloquy. “No pigeons or owls to send messages. Next thing you’ll tell me— hey, you’re the dumbass here, okay? I’m trying to help you. If I don’t believe everything you say, it’s with a good reason.”

Wade huffs and really he rolls his eyes mentally at this guy here, but what neither he nor Peter expect is Wade leaning forward and licking his chin. They both freeze, and Wade’s horror rises just like the growls did.

“Was— was that a thank you? For— helping you?”

Wade nods with too much enthusiasm, because he doesn’t even know himself why he did that and that explanation is something they can both believe. Besides, he  _ is  _ grateful that Spidey is putting up with his antics and helping him out despite him pretty much lodging there freely.

Right.

He should give Spidey access to one of his accounts so that he can make use of the money for whatever he needs. With that in mind, a welcome distraction really, he rearranges the numbers into an incomplete bank account number. Why do they always have lots of zeroes?

“What’s that?”

He answers.

“Bank account? What for? Do you need money from it?”

Head shake. Then:  _ for you. _

“Me? Whatever for would I use them? It’s yours.”

Wade explains with abbreviations and a lot of words left out. Words that he’d abuse relentlessly if he could speak.

“No.” He shakes head. “I won’t make use of your money. I have enough for the both of us. Besides, you don’t eat a lot and are not picky.”

_ Because I can’t fucking talk! _

He growls, but there’s no heat and Peter huffs as he stands up. They don’t talk about it after that only because they call the Good Witch and find out that she’s never heard of a curse that has no cure, or anything else the cursed person needs to do in order to break it. 

“But I find it peculiar that your friend has two dog forms and that he’s been human for a little while.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, phone on the bed between them, Wade curled up on the opposite side. “The second form resulted because we were in a nasty situation and he got angry.”

“What form is he in now?”

“The second one.”

“And he’s been like this for how long?”

Peter checks his wrist watch. “More than half an hour.”

“So anger might be a catalyst, but it’s not what keeps him like this,” she says, sounding as if she’s speaking to herself. “Was there anything unusual about the first transformation?”

“No… well, he kind of… did away with some people. He was covered in blood, but when he saw me he didn’t attack, but wobbled and transformed into his human form before going back to being a puppy.”

“Hm, the second transformation is an anomaly.”

If she only knew what a piece of sunshine his human form was!

“My guess is that the curse somehow spliced into two when the second transformation happened. The human body can hold two forms, but not three, so I believe that one of the three forms will disappear in time.”

Wade meets Peter’s eyes. “What if it’s the human one?” 

Wade’s ears are pricked.

“Then… I’m sorry.”

“Isn’t there any way we can stop that from happening? Any other… spell or potion or something to keep him from disappearing completely?”

“I’m afraid not. A spell or a potion requires the curse, just like the antidote needs to be made from the poison, but the book your friend read from disappeared alongside the house, and I cannot track it since it’s warded so heavily.”

Peter curses under his breath and Wade feels compelled to comfort him.

“But you could try to keep his memories alive. Remind him of who he is every day. It’s even better if you shared past experiences together, especially the ones that forged your friendship, trying experiences have more weight. I’m sorry I can’t help you more.”

“It’s okay. I’ll try that. Thank you for your help.”

Wade looks at Peter; he has that look that says  _ deep thoughts  _ and  _ maybe possibly bad plan but I’m gonna go with it because I’m Spidey and I have webs, I can web the consequences on the fucking ceiling. _

This fucking situation makes Wade be the  _ reasonable  _ one because  _ hoe, don’t do it!  _ Whatever Peter’s thinking of doing.

“Remember the many times you tried to kill me?”

Wade groans, but it comes out as a growl. The way he throws his head back should tell Peter that he’s not actually growling at Peter. Well, he is, but not in a threatening way.

“Yeah, me too. I always stopped you, though.” The smirk is totally uncalled for.

Wade shows his sharp teeth and Peter leans back a bit, before he seems to reconsider and does the fucking incredible thing: he grabs the corners of his mouth and pulls as much as the skin stretches. He’s too shocked by the action and then the little chuckles to do anything but stare at this person who puts up with his shit and gives back as good as he takes.

“Good, you’re still you.”

He snaps out of it and snaps his teeth at the nearest hand, but Peter has spider reflexes and his teeth don’t sink into his flesh.

“Oh, he bites! Better take care  _ who _ you’re biting. This hand,” he lifts one, “and this one, together, feed you. So I wouldn’t harm them.”

Wade snorts, but his throat or nose or whatever is not equipped to produce such a sound, and instead he sneezes.

“Glad we’re on the same page, hell spawn.”

Peter jumps off from the bed when Wade lunges for him, the giggles filling the room as he climbs up on the ceiling because Wade’s not done and now he really wants a bite of this irritating version of Spidey.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where I'd say that the archive warning applies.

Day five since the phone conversation and his cute self is nowhere in sight. What the fuck?

Instead he has to share a shitty, one person bed with a full grown man whose preferred position is starfish. This is the fourth time he wiggles his black, un-cute butt to get the leg off his back.

“Wade, my arm fell asleep. Move. And who let you on the bed?”

_ You did when you cuddled me to death last night. Ain’t your teddy bear. _

But despite his grumpy attitude that seems to be his default now that he lives with the superhero, he— doesn’t mind that much. Rather, he’s getting used to Peter’s antics and his habits just as Peter is getting used to him. He pushes himself up and then jumps down to stretch like dogs do. 

There’s a restless energy thrumming underneath his skin that not even evening walks cut it. He needs action; he needs to shoot someone’s brains out and break somebody else’s bones. Action.

He tells as much to Peter after they have breakfast and he agrees reluctantly to take Wade with him on his patrols.

“But when I say stay, you stay or you won’t come with me ever again, okay?”

He huffs, but nods.

Being picked up with one hand as if he weighs nothing is— not as bad as he first thought. He forgot how it feels to use Spidey as a lift home. Or a lift towards a fight, in this case, because they find one as soon as Wade feels Peter tense suddenly, which means that those spider senses alerted him of something, and they change course.

The fight— it’s a mess. But Wade kills without regard and only freezes when Peter says ‘don’t’ when he’s ready to pounce on a poor fucker that was indirectly involved in the fight. Weirdly enough, he’s not told to not kill anyone or is reprimanded afterwards. And now he’s itching to ask him why.

But Spidey’s senses kick in a split second too late, followed by Wade’s gut feeling and Peter’s blown off into the warehouse’s opposite wall by a silent time bomb.

 

***

He’s groggy and disoriented when he comes back, unable to make heads or tails of the cacophony of sound that filters through his haze. The first thing he notices is his arm, the suit burned from above his wrist to his elbow, the skin dark and probably bleeding. It’s an effort to push himself up and focus on something that’s not an uncoordinated body coming slowly back online.

The second thing he notices is a naked man taking hits and fighting off the criminals— unarmed. 

He doesn’t notices the third thing, which is the human shape Wade’s in, because he’s busy springing up and bodily pushing Wade away from an incoming grenade. He protects Wade as best as he can with his own body, but he cannot cover every inch as cement pieces and wood rains down on them.

“The fuck is this? A war zone?” Wade says, and he sounds okay and alive and very pissed. “Hey, baby boy, you all right? Got it out of your system, the whole heroic stint? You know I can re—”

But he trails off and when Peter tries to push himself up and off Wade, his arms give out on him and he gasps. There surely is pain somewhere, but he cannot concentrate on any specific point on his body right now. Everything is numb.

“Wade,” he says, turning his head so he can spy Wade’s unmasked face with his right eye. “We need to get out of here. They’re too many.”

“We will.”

Peter feels like he’s skinning himself alive just by hearing two simple words coming from the man whose arms are under Peter’s and is now gingerly lifting him up. With a closed off expression he carries Peter off to the side and places him in a weird position; the only part of his body that touches the cold, metal beam is his right arm and temple.

“Wait for me here, baby boy. I need to see a group of soon-to-be-dead-people about some murder.”

“What?”

But Wade takes off, picking up a machine gun from a dead person some steps off a stack of craters. He wants to warn Wade about the guy that’s atop them, pointing the gun at Wade, but before he can muster the strength to shout, Wade’s arm lifts and shoots the guy without even aiming.

 

***

“Don’t turn, don’t turn, don’t turn back,” he mumbles to himself under his breath as he eyes every single motherfucker either on the ground or atop of something.

He needs his human form for this, although he wouldn’t be displeased if his monstrous form would come out to play. But he’d like to do more than claw and bite and rip off.

He shoots each one with a precision that he’d applaud himself, if he had time or was in a playful mood, but he’s not playing right now. He stopped playing when his hands came off soaked in Peter’s blood. This is personal.

When the machine gun is out of bullets, he takes a guy’s knife, which he thought he’d be able to use to injure Wade, and pushes it beyond the hilt into said guy’s left eye, until the tip of the knife breaks free on the other side. He doesn’t make it in time to take the knife and use it on the next motherfucker who jumps off towards him because they tumble into a messy roll, each trying to get the upper hand and push the other into a chokehold or some other hold.

Wade manages to bend the fucker’s head until he hears his spine crack in multiple places and leaves him sprawled at an odd angle.

He’s doused in the blood of his enemies by the end of his killing spree. Except the ones that died by bullets, the rest are mangled messes that will make an entire team of hardened forensics lose their meals.

Nobody messes with his Spidey and comes out alive.

But when he returns, Peter’s unconscious and his heart leaps out of his chest before he checks for the pulse that’s there and lets a long sigh echo off the walls of the warehouse. He’d like to clean himself and not dirty Spidey with those scumbags’ filthy blood, but he cannot transport Peter in any other way but in his arms, so he takes a jacket off of the nearest fucker and places it over Peter’s back where he’s the most injured.

With careful hands he gathers the man to his chest and leaves the bloody warehouse behind.

 

***

When he finally opens his eyes, after trying to pick out what kind of weight is keeping him down and so warm, he’s greeted by red orbs, calmly staring at him.

Apparently, he’s half sprawled on his stomach, one leg bent up on the bed, the other mostly straight, and one hand along his body while the other is tucked under his cheek. Wade’s lying on his legs, though.

“Wade, legs, numb. Off,” he mumbles, still unable to make his mouth work.

Wade huffs, but lifts himself and climbs down the bed to sit close to Peter’s side. When he tries to turn the other way (dog breath is not the first thing he’d like to smell in the morning; his own mouth is a decaying tomb already), he groans and gives up before lifting more than his head.

“Oh god, what happened?” 

He experimentally wiggles his toes and then his fingers and finds all four responding promptly. He can feel his legs and arms, but there’s a wide patch he is not able to feel although his whole body is warmer than usual.

Wade whines and Peter is reminded of the fact that in this form he can’t speak, so he gingerly pushes the back of his fingers onto his back just to feel bandages and that’s when he remembers about the explosions.

“Shit, I’m pretty screwed up, eh?” He huffs a weak laugh, but Wade whines more and then licks his cheek. “Did you carry me here? I saw you turned human back there, but I lost consciousness after you killed that guy.”

Wade nods, and Peter sighs, then closes his eyes, but opens one. He won’t even bother keeping Wade responsible for the death of those criminals. Not because they deserved it — because let’s face it, they so did — but because he’s hurting and Wade took care of him and now he’s back on four legs. Surprisingly enough, Peter finds that more important than the early demise of a gang he was going to turn in to the police anyway.

“Did you clean my wounds?” Nod. “How big— is the wound on my back big?” Pause. Then a reluctant nod. Peter sighs again, a bit more shaky. “Is it deep?” Head shake. “Good, then that means that it’ll heal faster. “How long was I out? Tap once for a day, twice for two. Don’t tap if it’s been less than one.”

Wade lifts the big, white paw and taps twice.

“What happened? Did you turn back when you brought me— where are we?”

Wade makes a frustrated noise, then bows his head multiple times, scratching with his paw on the carpet like horses do.

“I’m not sure what you’re trying to say. It’s not my place.” Head shake. “Yours?” His head leans left and then right for a couple of times. “Hotel?” Head shake. “Is this yours?” Nod. “So… safehouse?” Nod.

Peter closes his eyes to think, to take everything in.

“Were you like this since you brought me here?” Head shake. “So you’ve been in human form for longer than a few seconds.” Nod. “I’d like to know how much, but I don’t think you are in the habit of playing with magnetic letters and numbers when you come here.” Wade huffs. “How long did you stay human?” He taps once on the bed. “Hmm.”

“Okay. I need to get up otherwise I’m gonna pee myself.”

With herculean effort he manages to get on his knees, stopping to get the dizziness under control. It’s hard to pee when it hurts to bring your hands to your front, but he grits his teeth and does what needs to be done. The place Wade brought him to is not much, a wide living room with a kitchenette to one side, the small bedroom he was in and the tiny bathroom he just came out of which is inside the bedroom.

The apartment is a mess of clothes, guns, knives, bullets, socks, some old, smelly toys, and questionable bags. He doesn’t ask and steps cautiously around because he’s just in his underwear and the elastic bandages that cover his back and front. Wade brings him his suit and it’s semi-dirty, but torn and singed in multiple places. It smells of clean laundry and he throws a small smile at the creature that sits in front of him and watches his every move.

“You wouldn’t have a clean pair of pants and a hoodie with a zipper I could borrow, do you?”

Moments later Wade brings him exactly what he asked for, and he pulls them on with difficulty. He has to use the laces on the trousers so that they won’t fall off him. Dressed a few degrees warmer, he realizes that he didn’t ask the important question.

“What happened to the ones we were fighting?”

Wade makes a sound like a whine and turns his head. Now whatever is the meaning of that. He crouches in front of the black hound, which simply makes Wade taller by two heads than Peter. Wade refuses to look at him, so Peter does the next logical thing he can and buries his hands into the dark and white mane which makes Wade jolt and turn his head. They’re a hairsbreadth apart and Peter finds, for the first time, that red eyes might be scary at first, something made out of horror movies, but given time, which he had in spades, it’s not hard for Peter to find beauty amidst the coal-burning orbs.

“What aren’t you telling me, Wade?” He pushes himself back, but Peter’s hands fasten like vices around his neck, which prompts Wade to push harder and try to dislodge Peter. “What did you do?”

He doesn’t mean them to come across as judging, but they do. They do and Wade freezes, his slightly labored breath the only one loud enough to fill the silence between their locked gazes. And then Wade’s right eye shimmers from red to blue to red again, just before his fur shifts along with muscles and bones, and Peter lets go, eyes widening when Wade returns to his human form.

“I kept you safe, that’s what I did,” he spits out, and this is when Peter realizes how much anger there still is in this man.

His canine form buffered most of it, but like this, naked and very much able to talk, there’s nothing that can put a damper to Wade’s anger.

“You were bleeding! Your whole back was— still is a mangled mess! How— why is it bad that I wanted to keep you safe?”

Words gets stuck in Peter’s throat as the man stands up in all his naked glory, using anger like his only cloak, turning so that only half of his body is bathed in the flimsy rays of sun filtering through the window. Peter lets himself fall back on his ass.

“You— you’re back.”

That garners Wade’s attention as he looks down at Peter and, for a moment, the anger freezes on his face as he tries to comprehend what Peter’s talking about, but then realization dawns on him and his eyes widen minutely.

Peter pushes himself up, and there’s still almost a head difference between them.

“I am,” Wade says quietly, staring at his own hands.

“I’m sorry,” Peter says in one breath. “I didn’t mean it to come across as judging. I was genuinely curious about what happened after I passed out.”

Wade opens his mouth, eyes roaming feverishly over Peter’s face, and then closes it again, looking elsewhere.

“What do you think happened? What  _ can  _ happen when I’m around? Really, Parker, pull your head out of your perky ass and smell the murder.”

Peter blinks, unable to decide if he should laugh, get annoyed or shocked at what came out of Wade’s mouth.

“So they’re all dead,” he says it out loud because he needs a confirmation.

Wade sighs. “They started the shitshow. I finished it.” His attention returns to his hands, palms up. Peter’s not sure if it’s fascination with the fact that he can look at them and see scarred flesh and fingers instead of black fur and deadly claws or something else entirely. “It was so red—” He shakes himself out of whatever memory he was reliving. “Anywho, I’m starved. Want take out? I’m paying,” he says, a lilt to his voice that was not there before as he goes around the room in search for something.

“I should probably go,” Peter says slowly, as if testing out each syllable, never leaving Wade out of his sight.

Which is why he sees how he freezes mid-way towards leaning down to pick a mound of clothes. His narrowed gaze sends a familiar shiver down his spine; not quite his spider sense, but not far away either.

“You should stay,” Wade counters.

“You’re back. You’re you again, and I need to— sleep this,” he points with his thumb over his shoulder, “off.”

“There’s a comfy bed not far away from you.” He motions with his chin as he picks the pile of clothes and moves them to the table near the window on top of gun parts.

“I need to check the wounds.”

“Did that already. Plus they’re on your back, and even with your flexibility, you won’t be able to change the bandages. You’ll need me.”

Okay, who is this guy? Where does all that confidence and no-bull talk comes from?

“And I’ll need you.”

That takes Peter by surprise. “What for?”

Wade pulls on a pair of baggy sport pants and walks over to Peter.

“This won’t last for long. I’m not cured. I’ll turn back at some point. I’ll need you to be around.”

Peter considers him. “I haven’t seen the puppy in a long time. And the witch said that one of the two forms will disappear. I think you’re saddled with your monstrous form.”

Wade purses his lips. “Yes, monstrous. The perfect reflection to all of this.”

This is why Peter’s so socially awkward. Shit comes out of his mouth he doesn’t mean and people get offended or hurt.

“Will you stop being a cranky asshole for one minute so we can clear the misunderstandings that  keep piling up on top of each other?”

He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Sorry. The restless energy is back and that makes me more—”

“Cranky.”

Wade shoots him a nasty look. “Aggressive.”

“So cranky.”

“Goddammit. Were you always this annoying? In your suit, you’re PG-annoying, but out of it, you’re Chaotic Annoying. What the fuck?”

For some odd reason, Peter feels that the only adequate answer to that is a toothy grin. He has no idea what is happening, but there’s a thrill coursing up and down his spine, making him more daring. Wade won’t attack him, in this form or the other, a thought that he’s not sure where it comes from, but the fact that Wade simply stares dumbfounded at it cements that knowledge. 

“Back to our main topic of discussion,” Peter says, schooling his features. “Considering that you’re a full-fledged hound, you won’t be needing my help to get to higher grounds or open the fridge. You might have problems ordering takeaway, but I’m sure they’ll understand if you growl slow enough.”

“Are you pulling my leg, Parker?”

“What? You thought you were the only one who could sass here? Then you have another think coming.”

Again, Wade opens and closes his mouth, and Peter’s not sure but he suspects Wade hasn’t blinked once since they came head to head. And human Wade’s stares are not that different from the puppy or hound one.

“I’m not staying, just to make it clear. Obviously something is happening with the curse if you can be in this form for this long. So you can plan ahead for when you go back to your animal form. I’m only sorry I couldn’t help you find a cure to it.”

He heads towards the door.

“Is it that bad that I can change from this?”

The vulnerable note at the end has Peter turn around. “No, no. I don’t know how it is, but I only thought that it complicates your life unnecessarily if you transform randomly. Kinda cuts down on your outings.”

Wade nods slowly, fixing a point on the floor somewhere, and Peter leaves.


	7. Chapter 7

One thing is clear during the following days: Wade was right. No matter how much he twists and turns (always careful to not push it past the limit of his pain tolerance) he cannot get the bandages to cover his whole back as well as Wade managed.

Not to mention applying the ointment, but he’s creative so he improvises with a clean cloth and a back brush that’s long enough to reach the middle of his back.

He doesn’t hear from Wade for a week. Granted, he hasn’t been on patrol for that long because he won’t risk an infection or the slowly healing wounds to open again. But because of his mutated genes, he heals almost completely in more or less eight days, so for a week, New York has to fend for itself.

The first night on patrol after so many spend cooped up in his apartment feels surreal. He almost crashes into a building when he changes arms, as if it took this little time to forget the simple play that his hands do when he moves around the neighborhood.

But that’s not it. He is distracted. More than that, he is searching for someone. A flash of familiar red or the sound of that familiar voice. Nothing.

Then the crash happens.

No. He’s still Spider-Man. He didn’t lose that much of his superhero persona or his ability to swing by without collateral damage. The crash is not something he involuntarily set himself up to, but something else crashed into him.

It’s hard to focus on anything when they’re blasting through a window and they keep tumbling and hitting hard objects until whoever is fighting with him pushes him through the window at the other end and that’s when he see them.

The red eyes.

And a snarling, growling, two hundred pound black hound, with rivulets of white streaking his coat like veins growing from his right paw, in mid-air jump, his left, front paw extended so that he can eviscerate Peter with those nasty-looking curved claws.

“Wade?”

Just before the claws make contact with his torso, shredding yet another suit — which, incidentally, is the first one Wade ever destroyed and he was barely taller than his ankle — his right eye shimmers blue before returning to the deep red that’s promising hell and brimstone.

They both fall, the growls and snarls vicious and like this is a wild animal somebody let loose in the city. Peter tries to keep him at bay, but his forearm won’t do much faced with sharp fangs, not to mention that they’re still free falling.

He shoots a line— too late as they crash on the concrete. Peter groans from the uneven hole he made just to the side of the sidewalk, and it must be one of the less used back streets because there’s only one car and a bicycle that rushes past him. The growls are the first to alert him of his presence to his left.

“Wade? Wade, what happened? It’s me, don’t you recognize me?”

No sign of recognition as the beast hurls himself at Peter. Not even his webs can keep him still. Those claws must be made from something other than bone or be sharper than a diamond’s point because he slices through his webs like a knife through butter. Talking doesn’t help, no matter how many times Peter calls out his name.

And then he’s slammed into another building, because apparently that’s how they roll now.

Yeah, no. He’s not gonna let himself be killed by a feral dog, even if said dog is someone Peter knows.

He attacks Wade and uses his strength to get the big dog underneath himself, one hand keeping those strong jaws close while the other one and his legs keep Wade’s paws and claws pressed to the ground.

“You will remember who your are, Wade. You will come back to me, do you understand me? You are Wade Wilson, alias Deadpool. You use to go around and kill people for money. But you’re not a cold blooded killer. Do you understand? You’re a good person deep down. You help people, even if most of the times no one else realizes that. Wade, you will come back to me! Remember! Remember who you are! Remember me. Your Spidey. Webhead. What else did you call me? Something… ah, baby boy. You’re under a curse—”

The fight left Wade in the blink of an eye, but Peter was reluctant to let go. Wade’s laboured breathing is the only thing that keep Peter on high alert as he has his eyes closed, so Peter can’t know if it’s just a ruse to get him to relax or Wade remembered.

The blue eye that greets him and the huff reassure Peter that Wade is back.

“Hey you,” he says softly, lightening his hold in increments until he takes the hand off of his muzzle completely.

A confused woof and then Peter stands to let Wade get his bearings. He looks around at the damage around, then at Peter, and then takes off before Peter can blink.

It takes him a moment before he runs after him, using his webs to cover more distance with minimal effort. It’s easy to track Wade down from above and in no time he reaches a rundown building on which Wade climbs to the top and gets inside. Peter follows just in time to see Wade returning to normal.

“Wade, are you okay?”

There’s a crazed look in his eyes as they roam around the room, not focusing on anything. His breathing comes out fast and uneven, and Peter’s pretty sure it’s not because he ran across the city to reach this place.

“Wade?”

“Get out!” he snarls, voice abnormally low and growly.

Peter hesitates.

“What’s wrong? Wade?”

“Get out, get out, get out!” he says, retreating to the wall when Peter closes the distance between them.

He stops and regards Wade. It’s not a crazed look on his face, but a scared one. He’s scared of something— or someone.

“Wade, I’m not gonna hurt you! I never did. Look, you attacked me out of—”

That’s when he focuses on Peter. “I did what?”

“You— attacked me. When I was swinging by… you don’t remember?”

“Look,” he says after a few moments, “I don’t know what the fuck is happening, but there’s this jittery feeling under my skin that’s fighting to get out and I don’t know how much I can keep it from doing that.”

“You fear you’ll transform back?”

He nods. “And I don’t think I’ll be able to keep my wits about. So go. Just— go away and never come back!”

That, more than anything, has Peter’s feet grow roots and infiltrate the ground.

“What do you mean? What happened, Wade?”

“I don’t _know,_ okay?” He pushes his hands over his bald head, twining his fingers at the back. “You left and then takeaway happened and I fell asleep. I was pissed and annoyed with you and your stupid decision. We’re— we’re supposed to be together, okay? That’s what my lizard brain kept telling me. You’re not— you should’ve been there. To ground me.”

“Are you sayin—”

“Yes!” Pause. “No. I _don’t fucking know!_ I woke up and was the nightmare again. I tracked down your smell, but then I lost it when I approached the main street and shit spiraled down from there. And now I’m here.”

“You mean— you’ve been like that for the whole week?”

“Guess so,” he says to the floor, palms massaging his neck.  

There’s only Wade’s labored breathing that echoes in his mind as he puts two and two together. He approaches Wade despite his protests and the way he brings his naked legs to his chest to make himself as small as possible in the hopes of not touching Peter and— what? Transfer the madness to him? He’d snort if he didn’t want to spook Wade even more than he already is.

His palm touches Wade’s shoulder, caressing slightly and takes off his mask because he needs Wade to see his face for this.

“Hey,” he says softly, waiting until Wade meets his eyes. “I won’t go away. I proved to you that I can hold my own whether you’re you or a hound. I’m not afraid of you, Wade, because I care about you, even if that sounds crazy considering what we’ve been through since the first time we met. I’m here and I’m apologizing for leaving you stranded and alone. I won’t go away.”

Wade’s breath stutters, eyes frantic as they roam over Peter’s face. Then, slowly, he untwists himself, one hand coming up to cup Peter’s cheek as the man leans in hesitantly. Peter lets him do what he needs to. If that means a kiss, then Peter’s there. But Wade goes for a hug instead, and it’d be actually bone-crushing, if Peter would’ve been simply a human.

He returns the embrace as Wade takes big gulps of air, breathing Peter in. Hopefully he doesn’t smell of sweat too much, but he doesn’t hear any complaints from Wade, so he’s good.

Then Wade picks him up.

“What the—”

“I need this,” Wade says, moving them towards the bedroom. “Don’t— don’t do— just. I need this.”

So Peter lets him have this too. This being a cuddling session where Wade spends all his time simply breathing Peter in before falling asleep, his body half on top of him.

Peter lets him have this, too, his gloveless hands caressing his back and head slowly.

 

***

Peter grounds him.

That’s the truth that cemented itself in his brain from the moment Peter touched him.

Peter grounds him and he’s abso-fucking-lutely powerless against it.

It’s only after he was appeased by the knowledge that his Spidey was safely tucked under him and his smell all around that the jittery feeling went away and he could relax enough to fall asleep.

But now that he’s awake and the warm body underneath him is breathing softly and evenly, he contemplates the turn this shitstorm took.

He really did lose his mind back then. Peter’s smell was fading and his hind brain was screaming at him to get him back and never let him go. But he couldn’t do that. Peter had made it clear that he wanted space. Or whatever the hell he wanted.

He lifts his head to look at the lax face, lips ajar and head lolled slightly on the opposite side. Spidey actually stayed and he’s actually sleeping in Wade’s bed, sharing body heat with him, no questions asked.

Is this love or is this simply a sure path towards codependency?

He proved that his nightmare relies on Peter to be kept at bay and on a leash.

Yet he doesn’t want that.

He’s relied on people to keep him sane in the past. It never turned out good. If there’s one thing he is sure he doesn’t want is to have such a relationship where he cannot stay sane unless the other person is nearby.

He’s had his agency and consent signed away when he agreed to the douchebags that made him who he is today. That was the first and the last time he will consciously let himself be at the hands of another being.

He tells Peter to go back and to stay away until he gains control over his nightmare. As he expects, Peter refuses and they fight because that’s like their status quo nowadays. In the end they end up with a compromise: Wade sends text messages every day to assure Peter that he’s still human, and he has to call him if he feels the jitters becoming worse.

They do. The next day after Peter’s departure, so he has to come back in the evening and soothe Wade.

They do this back and forth for a couple of weeks until Wade can go without feeling the need to transform for three full days.

First stage completed.

Now the fun part comes: turning into the nightmare at will.

He’s unable to, no matter how many times and what he tries.

Peter visits him and stays the whole weekend, which is when they learn that it’s easier for Wade to turn back when Peter’s around, and, most importantly, when Peter asks him to. They both stare at each other.

“Wow, okay. Turn back,” he says, leaning forward. Nothing happens. Wade doesn’t feel anything that would signal him shifting into his human form. “Turn back now?” Wade shakes his head. “So it only works from human to hound? How do you turn back? I order you to turn back!” He even waves his hand with a flourish which, really, Parker?

Again, nothing happens. Wade huffs. Oh, well, it’s not like he’s not used to this form. At least now he can go on for four days without feeling the need to shift, and when he does shift he keeps his wits about, which, apparently, is shown by the blue eye he sports instead of them both being red, which is a danger alert in Peter’s book. He’s pretty sure he would turn even if he doesn’t feel the need to. Or most probably if Peter is in danger. He pads towards the bedroom when Peter tries more words, these ones in Latin and yep, there goes Peter’s nerdiness on a merry spree.

Don’t get him wrong, it’s amazing for him to witness Peter’s whole face light up when he talks about this or that trivia, his fanboy springing up just like that. But he’s a nightmare now; he’s entitled to grumpiness, okay?

“Come on, Wade. Work with me! I’m trying to help!”

_Nah, baby boy, I’ll pass. Nothing’s happening. Might as well sleep it off._

“Wade,” he whines, “come back.”

The shift happens just as he’s placing a paw on the bed. He looks at Peter who stares back wide eyed.

They learn that even though Peter is able to trigger the shift, Wade can refuse to listen. They learn that the hard way when they fight and Wade’s being a stubborn asshole. Hey, his cutesy self is gone now; this nightmare is not a ray of sunshine, Parker. It comes with a lot of nasty baggage. This is where he finds his rage and darker feelings are stored. It’s so easy to tap into that and use it to his advantage.

But Spidey prohibits him from killing anyone. After the event in the warehouse, he makes Wade promise that he won’t go on a killing spree even if they injure Peter. The compromise Wade will allow is if the injury is not fatal. All bets are off beyond that. And he doesn’t give Peter any way out of that one, so he agrees.

Over the months they compromise a lot, which is better than fighting over this and that when they both know that it never amounts to anything good. And they’d both feel miserable afterwards, so why bother.

They fight together, eat together most of the time, Wade cheers Peter on when he gets another, better paying job, and he’s mostly at Peter’s apartment rather than the other way around. They use Wade’s safehouses to patch themselves up and sleep it off, if the fight takes a toll on the both of them.

This is the life Wade has right now, and truth to be told, he wouldn’t change anything. Not the fights or the compromises or the fact that the bed is still too damn small for two grown-ass men, but they got used to mostly sleeping on each other rather than separate, so neither complain.

It’s all good and balanced until Wade kisses Peter and looks at him as if Peter kissed him out of the blue. He’s not sure if it’s because Peter’s teaching him how to make meatloaf and both their hands are deep into the bowl with the minced meat or because Peter’s telling him about the day he had at the new job and how the newbie made a mistake that cracked the whole department up. Maybe it’s the body heat and the perfect, blissful moment they’re sharing that makes Wade forget about himself and lean down to press his lips to Peter’s.

“Well…” he begins, clears his throat and Wade’s preparing to fire an apology, when, “I saw this one coming from a mile away, but… what gives?”

“Wait, what?” Wade gawks and Peter’s grin takes over his whole face.

“What, you mean you didn’t think that this relationship was heading in this direction?”

“Um, no? We’re buddies?”

“Yeah, no. Buddies don’t share as much physical space as we do and as often.”

“So… you knew… what?”

“That you needed time to get comfortable and relaxed around me until you’d let your instincts get the better of you.”

“So you have me all figured out, hm?”

He finds he’s not bothered by this in the slightest. Not even by the fact that Peter was waiting for him to make the first step.

He rinses his hands in the sink and then dries them off, waiting for Peter to do the same.

“Not really. The kiss took me by surprise,” he said, eyes mostly staring at Wade’s lips, even as Wade’s hands snake around his back to pull him closer.

“This whole situation is a surprise.” He’s smiling because he can’t not when Peter’s smiling, too.

“But we made the best out of it, didn’t we?”

“Mhm,” he said against Peter’s lips.

 

***

Peter shoots another line, hearing the hard thuds as Wade follows him on the rooftops, jumping from building to building. Looking down at the big marks left behind by strong paws and an even stronger and heavier body, maybe taking the hound with him to his unpaid work was not such a good idea.

He steers them towards the less populated areas of the city.

“We’re gonna head towards abandoned warehouses, okay?” Peter shouts over the wind as he shoots another line. “So you can create damage without hurting anybody. But the buildings are not so close together, so you’ll have to trust yourself to take the leap of faith, okay?”

He isn’t sure if the bark is an affirmative or a negative or just something Wade felt like doing (he did a lot of that lately, like kissing him out of the blue or just doing the human version of a warm octopus on his back when he has important stuff to do), but he’s not stopping, so he’s gonna take that as a yes.

It’s only recently that they’ve started doing this. In a way, it’s like taking his dog for a walk— if the walk consisted of jumping from rooftop to rooftop and occasionally scaring or scratching bad guys.

Wade takes the leap of faith between two building that require Peter to shoot two lines to cross the distance.

The leap of faith ends with Wade crashing through the already broken windows of a medium size building and Peter landing on top of it.

“What the shit dinkles, Parker!” Wade shouts from inside.

He shakes his head from where he’s perched on the corner of the rooftop.

“You need to work on your leap of faith,” Peter calls out.

There’s some commotion from the inside and Peter leans down, one palm sticking to the face of the building, but then Wade’s hound slams his big paw on the face of the building and climbs, which makes Peter back up until Wade pushes himself off and over his head until he lands with a glide on the roof.

Of course Wade is posing. How could he not take advantage of the favorable wind that’s blowing in his face right now?

“See, you can jump high if you want to. Use that as reference for when you take your next leap.”

He growls, then huffs and stalks towards Peter, the blue and red eyes sending a shiver down his spine— only to have him lick half of his head.

“You do remember that my spare is not dry yet, right?”

He huffs and licks the other side, then turns back into his naked, human form.

“I do remember,” Wade says, a mischievous grin on his lips. “I also remember that you owe me a kiss, baby boy, so I decided that I want it now.”

Peter takes a moment to simply take this ridiculous man in, then slowly climbs down from his perch and closes the distance between them. Without conscious thought, Wade’s hand comes to rest at the base of Peter’s throat before he pulls the mask up above his nose and waits for Peter to bridge the last few inches between them.

And Peter does. He always does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspiration for the black hound: [[x]](https://www.google.com/url?q=https://mangapark.net/manga/wild-wind/i167898/v01/c001/32)  
> (in case the link doesn't work, it's the manga "Wild Wind", vol. 1, ch. 1 "Animal Trail", page 32).
> 
> I read and reread this manga so many times, and I always wanted to do something similar to the main idea of it. Which is why apart from the way Wade looks, I also incorporated the "hound needs a master to be controlled". But since it's me, I also left space for Wade to fight back against this control and keep his agency. It's better with Peter at his side, but he could survive without him, too.


End file.
